Long Lane Honey Bee Farms is a family beekeeping business designed to encourage, assist and educate others in the wonderful experience of beekeeping. We are the one stop beekeeping shop, providing classes and beekeeping and beekeeping equipment. We also provide an individual mentorship program by David Burns, EAS certified Master Beekeeper.
Visit Our Website at: www.honeybeesonline.com
Call Us At: 217-427-2678
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Saturday, July 26, 2014

Are you so “natural” in your beekeeping practices that you are actually killing bees? Hi, we are David and Sheri Burns. We operate Long Lane Honey Bee Farms located in east central Illinois. In today’s lesson, I want to discuss the dangers in how being too natural could be the cause of colonies dying in the winter.

There is the reality that the increased number of new and inexperienced beekeepers may be contributing to the increase in numbers of winter losses. This may be especially true with the number of new beekeepers who opt not to use chemicals against mites but also fail to use any non-chemical methods either. In other words, being so natural as to do nothing is not good. For example, as humans we know that washing our hands can help prevent the transfer of viruses. We’d never tell our children to stop washing their hands before they eat so that they can be more natural. Let’s talk more…

Before I continue, let me share that I’m excited about our website revamp. We are making our website so that the main front page is filled with tons of practical beekeeping tips, tricks and other helpful information. If you need to quickly go to our online store, you’ll see our Quick Help links on the left hand side. You can jump right into our online store which is opened 24 hours a day, 7 days a week.

You are currently reading our blog/lessons. Enjoy these lessons but be sure to go to: www.honeybeesonline.com for more information and beekeeping supplies.

We had great visit from Lee and Wei from the University of Illinois. Lellen Solter is an insect pathologist and is doing work on nosema, looking into competition between microsporidian species for host tissues, taxonomy of microsporidia, molecular relationships between closely related microsporidia, physiological effects of microsporidia on insect hosts, host specificity of microsporidia, disease in beneficial insects (bumble bees, honey bees, predators of hemlock woolly adelgid) and microbial control of the gypsy moth. Wei-Fone Huang is a Postdoctoral Research Scientist and recently published his work: Nosema Ceranae Escapes Fumagillin Control in Honey Bees.

Lee and her husband took one of our Beginning Beekeeping courses earlier in the year and started a few hives. It was great to chat with them about the negative effect that Fumagillin may be having on honey bees.

Finally, A Beekeeping Class Specifically Addressing How To Get Bees Through The Winter.

We have worked hard over the last 8 years to flood the internet with trusted, reliable and thorough beekeeping information. Beekeepers lose countless hives due to a lack of education. Specifically, many beekeepers are uninformed about best winter practices. The winter of 2013-2014 was very hard on honey bees. Thus, a lot of colonies perish in the north each winter.

We are working to curtail these loses by offering free online beekeeping information, on site classes and more.

Maybe you lost some colonies. It can be confusing trying to figure out why your bees died. They may have had plenty of stored honey yet still died. Maybe they had a great queen and were very populated but still died. Join me for an extensive 6 hour course on common reasons why bees die in the winter and what you can do to improve your hive's chances of survival. This class will cover topics such as: fall preparation, mouse protection, mite reduction, wind blocks, wrapping hives, heating lamps, winter feeding, insulation, moving hives into buildings or shelters, the biology of fat bodies, the timing of a new queen, pros and cons of double walled hives, dynamics of both Langstroth and top bar hives in the winter, the winter cluster and more.

Our Saturday class (Sept. 6th 2014 9am-3pm) has only two seats remaining, BUT we have added an additional class the next day to accommodate the additional interest.

You need to do all you can to fortify your colonies to be ready for another long and hard winter. Even “natural” beekeepers must take the necessary steps to ensure honey bees kept in domesticated equipment (this includes top bar hives and traditional Langstroth hives) are in great shape going into winter.

The price of this class could possibly save you the cost of several packages next year. Click on the Saturday or Sunday class links below:

At these classes we will actually evaluate several hives and determine why they may or may not overwinter well. We will also show how to manipulate frames for maximum food distribution during the winter. We will also build wind breaks, wrap hives, place on Winter-Bee-Kinds and more. This is a “must take” class for the serious beekeeper who is tired of replacing bees every spring.

The Eastern Apicultural Society Conference will be held at Eastern Kentucky University in Richmond, Kentucky. I’ll be taking in the most recent scientific discoveries as well as assisting with certifying future master beekeepers. If you are a new beekeeper or very experienced this is a great conference to attend. Consider attending by clicking here. I’ll be there Monday through Friday. If we’ve never met, but you see me, please introduce yourself.

While I’m at EAS, Jon Zawislak and I will be doing a live HIVE TALK podcast. We will be broadcasting Thursday morning, July 31 at 11:00 a.m. Eastern Time. If you’d like to watch or be on the air with us, email me (beekeeper.burns@gmail.com) so I can let you know where we will be. Don’t worry, if you are not there, you can still join us and ask questions on air. The number to call is: 1-724-444-7444. When you call in you'll be asked to enter our SHOW ID which is: 129777 followed by the # sign. Then the automated system will ask you for your Pin number which is 1 followed by the # sign. At that point, you'll be on the show with us so you can ask your questions. You will be muted unless you press * 8 on your phone and that will allow us to unmute you so you can ask your question. Call in around 10 minutes prior to broadcast, at 10:50 a.m. eastern time. If you want to just listen from your computer, go to: http://www.talkshoe.com/tc/129777

If you use a smart phone you can add the Podcast App and have our shows sent to your mobile device every time we produce a new one. Just go to iTunes and search for Hive Talk, scroll down to podcast and you'll find us there.

Or listen to our past episodes by clicking here or by copying the link below and pasting it into your internet browser.

Okay students, time for class. LESSON 159: Will Your Hive Die From You Being TOO Natural?

Generally most of us want to be as natural as possible. We don’t like the thought of pesticides on our fruit and vegetables. We don’t want antibiotics or growth hormones in our milk or meat. I even roast my own organic coffee beans. It just sounds better, even though I know that the bean is surrounded by the fleshly part of the seed which is thrown away. The bean is soaked in boiling water, fermented, dried, then I roast it at over 400 degrees (F). It’s hard to believe at that point that the bean would have any chemical residue. But, I still drink organic coffee.

Natural beekeeping is huge. The idea of dumping chemicals in a hive where honey is eventually harvested should concern us. We would all prefer honey from a colony that has never been exposed to any chemicals at all. Beekeepers raise justifiable concerns over farm chemicals such as neonicotinoids and imidacloprids. These are not just used by farmers but found in flea collars and yard sprays and many commonly used household pest control products. The impact that our chemical filled environment is having on the decline of honey bees is being pursued more aggressively, even by the White House.

Big chemical companies aside, what about going all natural as a beekeeper? Is this good for bees? If all natural means not using harsh chemicals in the hive, then natural sounds good to me. But if going natural means doing nothing at all and expecting the bees to flourish, then you might be surprised to find out that “natural” killed your bees. Doing nothing is harmful to bees.

This approach might work if we did not have things like varroa mites, small hive beetles, nosema and viruses. Occasionally, we meet the human extraordinaire. You know, the person who never exercised, ate bad food, smoked and consumed too much alcohol, bacon and eggs every morning and lived healthy into their 90s. Same is true with colonies. Occasionally there is the extraordinary hive that we never do anything to and they are perfectly healthy in every way. This is not the norm.

Being “natural” should not be confused with being cheap and lazy. Sometimes we just don’t want to take time to inspect the hive again. So we conclude that we are going to let nature take its course. Sometimes we are being cheap. We don’t want to buy a new queen or a beetle trap or green drone comb to trap varroa mites. So we conclude that we are being natural.

We need to realize that honey bees need our help. We have removed them from their natural habitat and placed them into our domesticated hive equipment. It’s not bad, but it’s just not a tree. Here’s a tree I removed bees from and as you can see it is sealed with propolis. Propolis acts as part of the colony’s immune system, killing dangerous pathogens such as viruses in the hive. The rough wall of the cavity inside a tree is covered with propolis by the colony.

I am currently experimenting with coating propolis inside hives like that of a tree to see if bees do better. If the inside of a colony was not so smooth, bees would smooth it out with propolis. My point is that when we remove bees from their natural habitat and place them into Langstroths or top bar hives we must still provide proper management techniques to simulate as much of their natural habitat as possible.

But even then, this is not enough because even hives in trees die from varroa mites transmitting viruses throughout the hive. We can talk about how cold and bad the winters are but wait! The reality is that not all colonies died. What did those surviving colonies have that the dead colonies didn’t have? If you had 10 colonies and 8 died but two didn’t, it begs the question, “What do those 2 surviving colonies have that the other 8 did not?”

It is nearly impossible to analyze a dead colony and discover what happen. But it is very possible to examine a surviving colony and draw some concrete conclusion. This is very important. If you kept detailed records of your hives that survived winter, then you can look back over your findings and discover answers as to what these hives had that the dead ones did not. Pollen, honey, mite loads (viruses), populations, age of queen, location, amount of propolis in the hive, etc., all can provide data to help us find keys to overwintering colonies more effectively.

But if all you are doing is nothing, being natural, then you really do not have any information. Minimally, you should be logging information about your natural approach to help you determine your level of success or failure. No one buys a new dog and refuses to feed it or water it and hopes it will naturally survive. If you pull ticks off your dog why wouldn’t you pull mites from your bees? Even organic gardens are watered and weeds are pulled.

There is a difference between natural beekeeping and hands off beekeeping. The two are not the same. What should you do now?

1. Reduce you mite load! This is a must. If you do nothing, viruses will overtake your colony this winter.

2. Provide food for your bees. They need protein (pollen) and honey. Between now and fall, your bees need to be well fed. But many beekeepers do nothing and during the late summer and early fall bees weaken from a lack of nutrition. We re now entering into the period of dearth coupled with honey being harvested from hives. They go into winter hungry and weak. At the Heartland Apicultural Society conference someone told me that their friend had 10 hives and she put our Winter-Bee-Kind on 9 of her 10 colonies. The only one that perished was the one without the Winter-Bee-Kind. More than just food, our system provides top insulation to reduce excessive condensation and provides an upper vent for bees to defecate out side the hive more often during the winter.

3. Re-queen. If your queen is more than 2 years old, she is likely to fail you during the winter. You cannot buy new queens next spring in time to save your colony. Re-queen within then next few months.

4. Simulate a colony’s natural habitat as much as possible. Coat the inside with propolis. Use screen bottom boards to simulate the distance between the bottom of the comb and the base of the tree cavity so that mites can fall out of the nest area.

THE TAKEAWAY

Be a natural beekeeper but not at the neglect of meeting your bees’ needs. Bees need your help in fighting off varroa mites and small hive beetles just to name a few. Rather than spend your time looking for a better queen or a better package or nuc provider, focus on becoming a better beekeeper. At our overwintering class we will talk in more detail about these things and more such as how to simulate the thicker wall of a tree in your Langstroth hive.

Also, Jon and I will be speak on the subject of this lesson on our next HIVE TALK at EAS next week.

That’s all for this week, enjoy your weekend and bee good to your bees,

Friday, July 18, 2014

Hey, I got beat at a game of checkers! Hello from Long Lane Honey Bee Farms. We are David and Sheri Burns here to help you enjoy being a beekeeper. And if you are thinking about becoming a beekeeper you are at the perfect place. Today I will give some pointers in determining when to take the honey super off and when to leave it. But before our lesson…

Christian is our youngest. He’ll be 7 in September. I spoke at the Heartland Apicultural Society Beekeeping Conference at Southern Illinois University in Carbondale,, Illinois last week. I rode my motorcycle down on Wednesday and Christian and Sheri joined me on Thursday. We stayed at the Giant City State Park in one of their cabins. This has been a vacation spot for our family since the 80’s. Here’s a picture of Christian playing a game of checkers with me at the Giant City Lodge.

On Thursday morning I started up my Harley, loaded up my thumb drive with my workshop’s presentations and rode through the beautiful Shawnee National Forest. It was awesome. Winding roads, giant cliffs, unique specialty shops soothed my soul. Bees are equally soothing to me. Bees have always had that effect on me, depleting me of stress and helping me keep life in proper perspective.

I’ve been thinking about this a lot lately. Life if very complex, mixed with happiness (new hive is doing great) and sadness (favorite hive died). Life is mixed with pain (ouch a bee stung me) and comfort (the taste of honey on warm, buttered bread). How we view the world is made up of what we believe to be true. What we believe is our daily driving force. How we respond to events and circumstances is determined by how we view the world. Some people are negative and always feel like the victim. While others, in worse situations, are generally positive and seek to encourage others. My world view is based on my belief in Christ. I desire to fulfill the Golden Rule found in the Gospel of Matthew 7:1, “So in everything, do to others what you would have them do to you, for this sums up the Law and the Prophets." Pastor Langstroth invented the hive used in beekeeping today. He found comfort in his bees. When you read his books, you get the feel that Rev Langstroth was gifted, bringing something into beekeeping that was beyond himself…Bee Space, and a hive where frames could be taken out, inspected and placed back without damage to the comb or death to the bees. I’m a junkie of his writings.

Honey bees show up in our science, art, music, marriage (honeymoon), and even in our language. We use terms like: bee line, mind your own beeswax, she has a bee in her bonnet. Bees put the fun in biology, botany, math and more. I digress….

You get the idea, right? Sheri and I love bees and beekeeping. We are passionate about it. It’s fun, enjoyable and brings a lot of peace into our lives. We have an old swing that hangs from the oldest tree on our farm. It’s an old maple tree that we tap and enjoy making our own maple syrup. Sheri and I enjoy this dear swing almost every evening. From our swing we can see and hear some of our hives. We’ve had swarms land in this tree. I’m not sure who this strikes a chord with, but could bees be just what you need? I enjoy watching my bees work hard all day, pollinating my garden and my neighbors’ gardens and fruit trees. Here they come bringing back nectar that will become honey on my table and to our customers. We know the same joy we receive from being beekeepers can be enjoy by others. That’s why we are passionate about helping more and more people become beekeepers.

Sheri and I are living the dream in many ways. Helping new beginners enjoy beekeeping really turns our crank! Every year we reach thousands of new beginners through our podcasts, websites, beekeeping classes and our online lessons. Every order we receive gives us the freedom to continue living off of beekeeping, experimenting with keeping bees healthy and sharing what we know FREELY with others. We get excited when we receive your order. My phone sounds a special ringtone when you place an order. It’s not just about the money, but about another person who is keeping bees and needs some equipment from us. It gives me hope that one day I might meet this customer and we’ll become friends. This happened just today. A couple was driving from up Wisconsin down to Kentucky and have been following this blog for years and just wanted to stop by. Unfortunately we close at noon on Friday, but as I drove into our Long Lane, they were sitting at the end and we had a great talk. I encouraged them to stop back in on their way back up north. From our blog they knew about Seth and Christian and even knew that I once lived in Ohio.

I guess what I’m saying is we ARE NOT a big beekeeping company. If we were beer we’d be a micro brewery. Years ago we made a decision not to become another huge beekeeping company, but to be a place where people can come, talk, touch and feel. A place where you can show up and sit in our swing, pet our dogs, watch Christian play and maybe look in a hive with me. We are more like the place that blows our own glassware or spins our own pottery. Many of you tell us that you chose to buy from us because you prefer to buy from a small family business. Thank you, it means a lot to us. Visit Our Store Online. I look forward to you making my phone go off with your order ;)

Speaking of placing an order and before our lesson today I have an important announcement about 2015 package bees which are available now. Last year, so many new beginners missed out on the short window of opportunity to buy packages. This year, we are offering a special for those of you wishing to secure your packages now. We are offering a hive with bees. This means you can now order your hive and bees and have your hive and bees secure before the 2015 rush begins. Single packages without hives, mainly for existing beekeepers, will go on sale in Nov. or Dec. We are offering two options online now:

Last year many new beekeepers didn't get to start because everyone sold out of bees in the winter. We sold out in about 30 days. This year we are making a special EARLY BIRD OFFER, so that new beginners can secure a hive and a 3lb package of bees with a mated queen. This kit contains a starter hive which includes a screen bottom board, one deep hive body with 10 wooden frame and foundation, an inner cover and a top cover. This starter hive allows you to add additional boxes to your hive only as needed. This kit also includes a 3 lb package of bees with a mated queen. Bees must be picked up only here at our farm. FREE SHIPPING OF WOODENARE HIVE WITHIN US, except Hawaii and Alaska. Bees can be picked up at our specified date in the spring, date to be determined, but probably late April or early May. The hive (woodenware without bees) will ship within 2 weeks of purchase. This is your way of making sure you are ready in the spring before all the bees are gone. Click here for more information.

This is the same as above only it includes the following equipment: Frame Puller, Frame Hanger, Bee Brush, Smoker, Smoker fuel, Hive Tool and Bee Brush. We do NOT include protective gear in this kit because some prefer suits while others would rather have a hat and veil. So protective gear is sold separately. Bees are not shipped but picked up only. FREE SHIPPING OF WOODENARE HIVE WITHIN US, except Hawaii and Alaska. Bees can be picked up at our location at our specified date in the spring, date to be determined, but probably late April or early May. The hive (woodenware without bees) will ship within 2 weeks of purchase. This is your way of making sure you are ready in the spring before all the bees are gone. Click here for more information.

Please visit our site and scroll down on the front page through all the useful beekeeping information. It will help us if you can place a link to our sight from your site or your club’s website. Also sign up for our constant contact newsletter. Thousands receive our newsletter to learn more about bees.

Finally, why not come and see us at our next class, “Getting My Hives Through The Winter” on Saturday September 6, 9am-3pm here at our honey bee farm. Learn about fall preparation, mouse protection, mite reduction, wind blocks, wrapping hives, heating lights, winter feeding, insulation, moving hives into buildings or shelters, the biology of fat bodies, the timing of a new fall queen, pros and cons of double walled hives, dynamics of both Langstroth and top bar hives in the winter, the winter cluster and more. Click here for more information.

LESSON 158: When Can You Take A Honey Super Off Or When Should You Leave It For The Bees?

Beekeepers throughout the country are flipping a coin trying to decide whether to remove the honey super on their hive or leave it on for winter. It is a tough call. So often I am asked that question. Often people feel pressured because they are afraid if they leave the full honey super on much longer, the bees will go up and transfer the honey down into the brood area. Think about what I just said. Isn’t that shocking. Steal their honey before they store it for winter??

When deciding to remove a honey super full of honey or to leave it consider these points:

1) Do they have plenty of honey for winter? In Illinois a hive needs 60-80 lbs of honey to make it through the winter. They often do have that much in their two deep hive bodies. When they do, take off the excess. You don’t have to. You can leave the honey super on all winter. But be sure to remove the queen excluder if you have it under your honey super.

2) Will they be able to gather up enough additional nectar to reach 60-80 lbs of honey before the first frost if you take it all?

3) Can you wait and harvest it in the spring? I’ve harvested honey coming out of winter because the bees didn’t need a super they over wintered with. So I removed it. Sometimes I’ve harvested honey out of the deep hive bodies in early spring to give room for brood.

That’s all for now. Sheri is out in California again. This time she drove Seth’s car out for him. Seth and Leah will be getting married in less than one month. Sheri has really enjoyed the road trip along Historic Route 66 again. We did that back in March when Seth returned from his deployment in Afghanistan. With their approaching wedding and move out to Twenty-nine Palms, Ca, Seth is capitalizing on his mom’s visit to ready up their house. They found a nice place off base to live. Seth has two more years in the marines and one more deployment…of all places…the Middle East. Sheri will be flying back home on Sunday.

Today I want to share some simple tips to help you increase your chances to get your honey super foundation pulled out so you can get more honey production.

Before today’s lesson, we need your help. Today, Jon Zawislak and I will be hosting another special addition of Hive Talk, and we’d love for you to call in and ask a question between 9am-10am central time. So set your alarm to join us in a hour. Here’s how:

Call in to ask your questions. The number to call is: 1-724-444-7444. When you call in you'll be asked to enter our SHOW ID which is: 129777 followed by the # sign. Then the automated system will ask you for your Pin number which is 1 followed by the # sign. At that point, you'll be on the show with us so you can ask your questions. You will be muted unless you press * 8 on your phone and that will allow us to unmute you so you can ask your question. Call in around 10 minutes prior to broadcast, at 9:50 a.m. central time. The show starts this coming Tuesday morning at 10:00 a.m. central time. If you want to just listen from your computer, go to: http://www.talkshoe.com/tc/129777

If you use a smart phone you can add the Podcast App and have our shows sent to your mobile device every time we produce a new one. Just go to iTunes and search for Hive Talk, scroll down to podcast and you'll find us there.

Or listen to our past episodes by clicking here or by copying the link below and pasting it into your internet browser.

Soon, honey flows will diminish. I have another 3-4 weeks of strong nectar flows. Now is the time to have every super on the hive to maximize your hive’s honey production. It’s a good year and we are working hard to keep up with honey super orders. A strong hive needs two or three honey supers this time of year. But when you place a new honey super on your hive, the comb is not draw out. It’s important to speed this process up. Here’s what helps me.

1. Apply additional wax to each frame. Some people heat wax and then brush it on the foundation. I just take a big ball of wax and rub it on cold.

2. Spray each frame with sugar water with a little bit of honey-b-healthy mixed in. This will draw the bees onto the foundation.

3. The next step is something that I do, but it might be a bit risky for some. I place a brand new super between my two deep bodies. By doing this, I’m placing additional space in the middle of the brood nest to accelerate the comb being drawn out. Why is this risky? If you leave it there too long, the queen will fill it with brood. I watch it every 5 days to see how much is drawn out and if the queen is filling it up with eggs. If you want to really be creative, you can exclude your queen, using a queen excluder, to the lower deep hive body. This will slow her laying down by limiting her space and this will reduce potential varroa mite reproduction somewhat. After 5 days, you can evaluate the hive and decide if they have draw out enough combs on your super to move it up to the top, above the second deep. If not wait another 5 days. Only do this IF you have your full number of populations.

4. Finally, the biggest mistake most beginners make is the put the queen excluder below a new super for undrawn foundation. This usually limits easy access into the super and increases the time it takes to draw out the comb.

Put on as many supers as you think your bees will fill up. I like to err on the side of having too many on rather than not enough.

Thanks for joining us for another beekeeping lesson. Remember to check out our complete website at: www.honeybeesonline.com and if you can provide a link to our site from your site we always appreciate that.

Call us in an hour at our radio number above and ask your questions. See you later.

Saturday, July 5, 2014

We are still in swarm season, a time when bees multiply by sending out 60% of their colony with the old queen to establish a new colony. Back home, the colony raises a new queen to build back up the population. Today, I want to share some tips on how to catch and retain a swarm.

Hi, we are David and Sheri Burns from Long Lane Honey Bee Farms in central Illinois. Next year will mark our 10 year anniversary in the beekeeping business. Some of you reading this lesson have been loyal customers since way back then. Thank you. For those of you joining us fairly recent, welcome.

Last week we just finished up another queen rearing class. Our students were from the Chicago area, North Carolina, Ohio, and Indiana.

I’ll be speaking at the Heartland Apicultural Society (HAS) Conference July 10-12, 2014, at Southern Illinois University in Carbondale, IL. This conference is open to everyone interested in beekeeping, including beginners. Regional & national vendors, as well as experts in the field of beekeeping, will be present. Hope to see you there. Click here for more information. Then July 28-Aug. 1 I’ll be at the Eastern Apicultural Society meeting at Eastern Kentucky University in Richmond, Kentucky assisting with the testing of future master beekeepers. The EAS is a great conference. Consider attending by clicking here.

We are keeping busy on the farm, teaching classes, attending conferences, removing bees from houses, speaking about bees and building equipment. I’ve heard from several states that a summer dearth has set in. A dearth is a period during the season when there is no longer a strong nectar flow. Bees usually get by on floral sources here and there. But large colonies with a large amount of young larvae will begin to suffer from the lack of incoming nectar and pollen. Nurse bees must consume pollen and nectar in order to produce royal jelly which is fed to all larvae for the first 3 days. Without royal jelly, larvae die from starvation. Therefore we are busying making our Burns Bees Feeding System to help bees receive sufficient protein and carbohydrates during a dearth.

Good nutrition is an essential part of keeping bees healthy. Bees deal with many challenges today and better nutrition in the summer and fall can give a colony a better chance this winter. By the way, I am offering a class on how to prepare your hives for winter. Click here for more information or go to: http://www.honeybeesonline.com/servlet/Detail?no=315 We still 6 seats available.

A quick word about our classes. Recently, someone told us that they attended a bee class in another state but they were unable to really learn as much due to the overwhelming size of the class. We purposely keep our classes small for a better learning environment. Our class sizes are limited and kept small so each student can be well trained. For example, that’s why we offer multiple classes on the same subject throughout the year rather than just offering one big class per year. Our students have told us how much they enjoy the smaller, more personable classes. If our Overwinter Class reaches capacity soon, we will offer an additional class in September. Imagine spending the entire day learning about fall preparation, mouse protection, mite reduction, wind blocks, wrapping hives, heating lamps, winter feeding, insulation, moving hives into buildings or shelters, the biology of fat bodies, the timing of a new fall queen, pros and cons of double walled hives, dynamics of both Langstroth and top bar hives in the winter, the winter cluster and more.To see our full list of 2014 classes still remaining click here.

The weather has been really nice around the farm. We’ve had great “bee” weather. Our bees are foraging heavy every single day and expanding rapidly. Here in central Illinois our Dutch clover (Trifolium repens) has really popped this year. I do not remember seeing this much yard clover, not only at our farm, but in towns and other areas. Bees love yard clover. It makes it very difficult for me to keep our area mowed because I hate to mow clover with bees on it. But, for clover to bloom again, it does need mowed every few weeks. So I try to mow after foraging hours.

I see rookie beekeepers making a big mistake this time of the year…NOT KEEPING ENOUGH HONEY SUPERS ON! Put more honey supers on. If your hive is strong, you should have two or three honey supers on this time of the year. Give them space and encourage them to fill up supers. To order more honey supers click here. Our honey supers come completely assembled and painted with wooden frames and foundation. Don’t miss this year’s honey crop!

Finally, we have a special Hive Talk Show coming up this Tuesday at 10 a.m. central time. Jon Zawislak and myself will be on the air to take your calls and answer your questions. Or you just might want to tune in and listen. Here’s how.

Call in to ask your questions. The number to call is: 1-724-444-7444. When you call in you'll be asked to enter our SHOW ID which is: 129777 followed by the # sign. Then the automated system will ask you for your Pin number which is 1 followed by the # sign. At that point, you'll be on the show with us so you can ask your questions. You will be muted unless you press * 8 on your phone and that will allow us to unmute you so you can ask your question. Call in around 10 minutes prior to broadcast, at 9:50 a.m. central time. The show starts this coming Tuesday morning at 10:00 a.m. central time. If you want to just listen from your computer, go to: http://www.talkshoe.com/tc/129777

If you use a smart phone you can add the Podcast App and have our shows sent to your mobile device every time we produce a new one. Just go to iTunes and search for Hive Talk, scroll down to podcast and you'll find us there.

Or listen to our past episodes by clicking here or by copying the link below and pasting it into your internet browser.

Hives are still swarming in our area. Catching a swarm seems simple enough. Take some empty equipment and set it under the branch where the bees are hanging from and shake them into the hive and go home. Well, sometimes it does go that well. But most of the time it involves more than I just described. So let me share some tips on how to hive a swarm.

First, make sure you have equipment on hand to put the swarm in. Every week someone calls in needing equipment yesterday because they caught a swarm. They didn’t have a hive to put it in so they put it in some sort of unacceptable container, like a 5 gallon bucket or a cardboard box. When you put swarm in a lacking container there is a good probability the colony will leave soon. It is either too hot, or they need more room.

One of our hottest selling items is a 5 frame nuc. We’ve sold so many of these this year. These make a very nice way to capture a swarm. They are small enough to conveniently lift and carry. I’ve learned to always have one in my car or truck. I’ve actually noticed swarms hanging from roads signs while traveling. If you have equipment with you, you can stop and retrieve the swarm. Our 5 frame nuc box is made up of a real screen bottom board which provides ventilation to your captured swarm while you drive them home. It’s also made of real 1” pine (3/4 inch actual size). Also includes an inner cover and telescoping top cover with metal. It’s just like a real hive only made for 5 frames which are included. It measures 9” across. It is also perfect to take for presentations instead of a full size hive. This nuc is painted and fully assembled and includes 5 frames and foundation. Click here for more information.

If your swarm is gigantic, you may want to consider our Emergency Swarm Hive. This is a screen bottom board, 1 Deep Hive Body, 10 frames and foundation, inner cover and top cover. Also comes with a tie down strap to keep the top on securely and a piece of screen to hold the bees in during the transportation.

Having available equipment is essential in being able to retain a swarm. I spray the frames with sugar water mixed with Honey-B-Healthy. The lemongrass odor helps attracts the swarm into the new hive.

Secondly, be very careful when climbing trees or ladders. Sometimes it is not worth the risk. But when you can safely retrieve the swarm wear a hat and veil and any other necessary protective clothing. Most swarms are not very defensive but bees are bees.

Thirdly, shake! When you shake the branch, the bees will fall and fly. Most of the bees will fall into your hive, hopefully including the queen, but others will take flight and land back on the branch near where the queen still is or where she was. So you may have to shake the branch several more times. Once the majority of the bees are in the nuc or hive, place the lid on and carry the hive to your new location.

Thirdly, do not be surprised if the swarm swarms again. Sometimes scouts from the swarm have already picked out a new place to direct the swarm to. As soon as they get organized, they can swarm again. Here’s a few things you can do to help keep the swarm. If you have another colony, pull out a frame of open brood with bees on it and place it into the swarm box. The frame of brood might help the swarm to feel obligated to feed and care for the brood and not leave. I do not worry about transferring the bees on the frame from one hive into another. Usually the bees on the open brood are 6-12 day old bees carrying for the open brood and get along fine in a different hive.

Do not be disappointed if your swarm colony replaces their queen. This is not uncommon for colonies that have recently swarmed. You’ll have to decide if you want them to take 30 days to raise a new laying queen or order a mated queen. If it is later in the season it might be helpful to feed the new swarm colony to build them up heading into winter. Continue to monitor mite levels. Hopefully this swarm will make you proud and become one of the best hives in your apiary.

What happens when bees are still swarming in the air but will not land. A technique I use that is helps is to take a dark sock and place lemon grass extract on it, and tie it somewhere in the air near the swarming bees. The bees are sometimes fooled to think the sock are other bees that have landed.

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